


watch out, love bites

by socknonny



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Fluff, Getting Back Together, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:07:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28299447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/socknonny/pseuds/socknonny
Summary: By Steve’s calculations, he broke up with Billy the day before the monster got him.A fic about breaking up, breaking apart, and coming home.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 7
Kudos: 85
Collections: Harringrove Holiday Exchange 2020





	watch out, love bites

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Antarc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antarc/gifts).



> Happy holidays, dear giftee!! I tried to give you something sweet about getting back together in the winter time, with a little Steve-centric hurt/comfort. I hope you enjoy! <3

By Steve’s calculations, he broke up with Billy the day before the monster got him.

That fact ranks somewhere between ‘he’s never going to college’ and ‘his parents might divorce because of him’ in terms of shitness. But if he’s honest with himself—really honest with himself—it hurts more than any of that added together. It hurts more than missed birthdays and lonely Christmases and distant relatives telling him he looks just like his father.

It hurts more because it means more, and every time Steve thinks he’s found the guts to go up to Billy’s front door, knock, and apologize, he loses it again. For one, their last argument wasn’t his fault, so he doesn’t really have anything to apologize for.

But… for two… he can’t bear the look on Billy’s face. He can’t stand to see the deadness in his eyes, the way he blinks a little too slowly these days, according to Max. Steve can’t stand the idea of seeing that Billy is damaged, and of knowing he had the power to stop it. No—worse—Steve had the power to make it happen, and that’s what he chose.

Because, while Billy started their last argument, Steve is the one who drove away. Steve is the one who told Billy he’d never amount to anything, that he was becoming what he hates. And then he left, because in Steve’s life the one who leaves has the power, and Christ he’s sick of letting people have power over him. So he’d left, and he’d waited, and he’d waited, and he’d… fuck, he’d assumed Billy would come running after him. Power yields results, and those were the results he’d expected. The results he’d been told to expect after a lifetime of witnessing the same pattern over and over with his parents.

Then he’d got somewhat waylaid by monsters, and now he’s too scared to face up to what he did.

So when Billy appears in the video store one day, eyes guarded but otherwise normal, it takes Steve a second to sift through the racing of his heart and understand what he’s looking at. He stammers, searching for the words to greet the man standing in front of him, and he can’t find them. Sometimes he struggles these days—to find the words that is. Not because he can’t speak, but because his mind races a little too fast, and he simply forgets he hasn’t spoken.

Not many people notice.

The frown on Billy’s face tells Steve he isn’t like all the others, and the realization hits Steve like a truck: Billy isn’t the one who’s damaged.

Steve is.

*

He leaves early, driving carefully as flakes of snow drift around him. Billy had gone for the normal approach, pretending everything was fine and otherwise not saying much, looking into the distance as Steve slid the VHS tapes into their cases. But their fingers had brushed, and it had been pure heat and fire, just as it always was.

And Steve had remembered that night in aching clarity—how he’d wanted to turn the car around within thirty seconds. He’d wanted to sit down with Billy and talk it out, but he hadn’t known how, and leaving was power, and then it was too late. Empty roads and tires squealing out on bitumen were the only choice he’d known how to make. And now one of them is broken beyond repair.

It just isn’t the one he’d thought it was.

The snow starts to fall in earnest, coating the roads and making it so Steve has to slow down so much it almost makes him nauseous. How long has it been this way? How long has he been racing around just to avoid throwing up?

He swallows thickly, parking the car and watching the snow pile up on his windshield. No one is home, and he’s in for a lonely few days if the weather is any indication. Looks like they’re edging into blizzard territory. He’ll have to cancel his shifts. Or, more likely, the choice will be made for him and he’ll simply be stuck at home with nowhere to go and nothing to do.

The nausea grows, sending his vision black around the edges, and he stumbles inside. If he examines the feeling too closely, he’ll be forced to admit things he doesn’t want to admit, like how, by his calculations—calculations made roughly thirty seconds ago—he hasn’t stopped moving since he found out the monster took Billy.

He hasn’t slowed down.

He hasn’t taken a breath.

He certainly hasn’t stopped.

A snow day trapped with only himself for company is the last thing he needs, but working out how to avoid his impending doom requires thought and consideration. It requires a brain that isn’t racing in circles, hurrying ever onwards. Steve can’t do that right now, so he hurries inside, barely glancing at the world around him, and slams the door.

He busies himself. Checking the cupboards, moving the pantry around so he knows where to find things if a blizzard does hit, doing his laundry, checking the windows, making some food. Moving, moving, moving.

How did he not notice this before? Christ, when was the last time he just sat still?

A pounding on the front door startles him, making him leap in the air and wonder for half a second if the noise is actually his own heartbeat. Of course it isn’t, so he changes direction and hurries to the door, opening it to find inevitability on his doorstep.

“Can I come in?” Billy asks.

The snow is already heavier, and Billy’s car wasn’t made for these roads, so Steve doesn’t really have an option.

Their footsteps echo through the house, and Steve doesn’t know where he’s leading them until they arrive at the kitchen. That’s right—he was halfway through making chicken cutlets. He resumes his position behind the knife, and he can practically feel Billy raising his eyebrows at the sight.

“I didn’t picture having this conversation over poultry,” he says drily, and Steve can’t help the laugh that slips out.

It’s just so normal. Like no time has passed, and monsters never existed.

“What conversation are we having?” he asks, even as he knows.

“The apologies one.”

“Right.” Steve takes a deep breath, preparing himself for the words he’s known for weeks he has to say. 

(Has he said them already? What has he said?)

“I’m sorry.”

The words aren’t Steve’s, and he looks up with a start to see Billy leaning back on the wall beside him, gaze fierce, nothing slow or unusual about him at all. Maybe Max was wrong. Or maybe… How long ago did Max say that anyway? How much time has passed since Billy came home?

“Me too,” Steve says, and the words make it feel like something heavy and thick has just settled inside him.

Billy frowns, a thin line wrinkling in the center of his brow. “What the hell are you sorry for?”

“I left and didn’t come back.” Steve swallows around the thickness, the nausea growing at rapid speed. “I was… trying to make you follow.”

Billy’s eyes widen in understanding, but to Steve’s surprise he doesn’t look angry. Instead, his mouth twists into something that looks like he’s trying not to laugh, and then he does. Just a huff of air, accompanied by a crinkling of his eyes that lets Steve know it’s real.

Even after so many weeks apart, Steve can read him like a book.

“You left because I pushed you away,” Billy says, so matter of fact, so lacking in heat.

Steve blinks. Maybe Billy has changed since the monster took him, after all, but maybe that change was for the better.

“We’re both idiots then,” he says slowly, washing his hands and coming to stand next to Billy.

“Never said I was Einstein,” Billy mutters, but again it’s lacking aggression. The familiar fast, toxic rise to anger is entirely absent.

Steve wonders abruptly if the reason he hasn’t been able to slow down is because he changed too, somewhere between monsters and torture. Maybe he’s sick of leaving and waiting for people to follow. The buzzing inside him might not be pathological after all; it might be a signal that it’s time to turn around and go back.

“The blizzard’s hit,” Steve says quietly, staring out the glass door, fingers clenching and unclenching at his sides. “I think… I think you’re stuck here.”

When he turns to Billy, Billy grins, unabashed and unconcerned. For a second, it’s so like a flash from the past that Steve just—stops. His stomach flips, uncertain what this sudden lack of inertia means for his sanity, but he doesn’t throw up.

“I think you could use a few days of peace and quiet, pretty boy,” Billy points out, head cocked as he studies Steve with eyes that are far too knowing.

The thudding of his heart is too loud. His blood pulses hot in his veins, and any second now the nausea could return, so Steve jolts into action. As Billy’s eyes widen, he grips the front of his shirt, twists it in his fist, and drags Billy into a bruising kiss.

It’s like coming home.

Billy’s fingers twist in Steve’s hair, tugging on just the wrong side of painful, and within minutes he’s backed Steve up against the wall. The wind outside howls, buffeting the glass door, and already the snow has piled up in mountains of white. It’s ice-cold, frozen in place and time, but inside the house Steve burns. The curve of Billy’s lips twists, wicked and—Steve realizes for the first time since he’s known him—happy. Steady. Like some toxic ache within him has just faded away and left him with peace.

Steve thinks he might know how that feels.

He pulls away, but he doesn’t go far. “And you’re going to give me that peace and quiet?” he asks with a hint of a grin, knowing the answer already.

Billy laughs, tongue running across his teeth as his gaze holds steady and piercing. “Not a chance.”

His fingers slide into Steve’s waistband, dragging him back in, and finally, finally the world slows down.


End file.
